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Friday, July 18, 2008

For reasons we can't quite fathom, people who've bought tickets for the Coldplay gig in Glasgow have been asked to send their tickets back in order to get new ones. On, erm, different paper:

Ticket distribution company Ticketmaster has asked fans to send back tickets bought through them for the shows on December 5 and 6 as soon as possible.

All customers affected by the mistake have been sent out freepost envelopes to return the tickets in, with Ticketmaster saying that they will refund all service charges.

We're at a total loss as to understand why it matters if the tickets are on the 'wrong' paper - obviously, it's a bit of a slip but since the tickets are good enough to swap for new tickets, why aren't they good enough for gaining entry to the actual gig? And what happens if someone doesn't swap out the tickets? Will they still be able to get in?

The faintest air of something dodgy hangs over the affair:

A spokesperson for promoter DF Concerts said that while all tickets bought direct from Ticketmaster would be exchanged in time, fans with tickets bought from secondary sources such as Ebay might end up disappointed.

"It will be more difficult to replace tickets originally purchased through Ticketmaster and then sold on through the secondary ticket market," the spokesperson said.

He added: "In this case, ticket holders should contact their point of purchase. We urge these secondary sources to look after their customers at this time."

This isn't an attempt to try and fight touting by creating a "but what if you bought your tickets from eBay and they needed to recall them" worry, is it?

Also: if Ticketmaster has the names and addresses of ticketholders to be able to send them an envelope for them to return the tickets, why didn't it just send them new tickets and cancel the old ones? Wouldn't that have been simpler?

If it really is a genuine mistake, it makes Ticketmaster look something of a shambles. If it's all a stunt, it makes Ticketmaster look like a shambles being run by knaves.

4 comments:

"if Ticketmaster has the names and addresses of ticketholders to be able to send them an envelope for them to return the tickets, why didn't it just send them new tickets and cancel the old ones? Wouldn't that have been simpler?"

not really as you'd possibly have 2 sets of tickets in circulation and there would be people who would also try to sell the unusable set - which would create a security problem on the night

@Paranoidman:But there are already two sets of tickets in circulation; and it's already going to be a security nightmare isn't it? What they've now generated is a situation where people can sell on their originals, then turn up without tickets and claim they'd sent the originals back "but the replacements never came". I really can't see why they didn't just go with the original tickets...

aren't they only sending out new tickets when they get the old ones back though?

hence it's the people who bought the tickets indirectly who will only face problems. Direct purchasers won't have two sets of tickets as to get the new set they'll have had to hand in the old

If they've recalled them because the wrong paper was used one can only speculate that the original tickets are easier to duplicate. Any decision they've made will probably be driven by the insurance situation and is probably out of their hands. If they'd have gone with the originals and fake tickets were in large supply they could well have been more liable having not taken appropriate actions to avoid a situation.

They've got the money in the bank anyway so having indirect purchasers turned away won't hurt them directly and if anything they get to blame the auction sites that are a threat to their business